endpoint security | Breaking Cybersecurity News | The Hacker News

A newly devised technique leverages a Windows accessibility framework called UI Automation (UIA) to perform a wide range of malicious activities without tipping off endpoint detection and response (EDR) solutions. "To exploit this technique, a user must be convinced to run a program that uses UI Automation," Akamai security researcher Tomer Peled said in a report shared with The Hacker News. "This can lead to stealthy command execution, which can harvest sensitive data, redirect browsers to phishing websites, and more." Even worse, local attackers could take advantage of this security blindspot to execute commands and read/write messages from/to messaging applications like Slack and WhatsApp. On top of that, it could also be potentially weaponized to manipulate UI elements over a network. First available in Windows XP as part of the Microsoft .NET Framework, UI Automation is designed to provide programmatic access to various user interface (UI) elements and h...

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CrowdStrike is named a Leader in the 2024 Gartner® Magic Quadrant™ for Endpoint Protection Platforms for the fifth consecutive time, positioned highest on Ability to Execute and furthest to the right on Completeness of Vision.

Microsoft has announced a new Windows Resiliency Initiative as a way to improve security and reliability, as well as ensure that system integrity is not compromised. The idea, the tech giant said, is to avoid incidents like that of CrowdStrike's earlier this July, enable more apps and users to be run without admin privileges, add controls surrounding the use of unsafe apps and drivers, and offer options to encrypt personal data. One of the most important features is Quick Machine Recovery that's expected to be available to the Windows Insider Program community in early 2025. "This feature will enable IT administrators to execute targeted fixes from Windows Update on PCs, even when machines are unable to boot, without needing physical access to the PC," David Weston, vice president of enterprise and OS security at Microsoft, said . "This remote recovery will unblock your employees from broad issues much faster than what has been possible in the past." ...

Apple has released security updates for iOS, iPadOS, macOS, visionOS, and its Safari web browser to address two zero-day flaws that have come under active exploitation in the wild. The flaws are listed below - CVE-2024-44308 (CVSS score: 8.8)  - A vulnerability in JavaScriptCore that could lead to arbitrary code execution when processing malicious web content CVE-2024-44309 (CVSS score: 6.1)  - A cookie management vulnerability in WebKit that could lead to a cross-site scripting (XSS) attack when processing malicious web content The iPhone maker said it addressed CVE-2024-44308 and CVE-2024-44309 with improved checks and improved state management, respectively.  Not much is known about the exact nature of the exploitation, but Apple has acknowledged that the pair of vulnerabilities "may have been actively exploited on Intel-based Mac systems." Clément Lecigne and Benoît Sevens of Google's Threat Analysis Group (TAG) have been credited with discovering and report...

Threat actors are attempting to abuse the open-source EDRSilencer tool as part of efforts to tamper endpoint detection and response (EDR) solutions and hide malicious activity. Trend Micro said it detected "threat actors attempting to integrate EDRSilencer in their attacks, repurposing it as a means of evading detection." EDRSilencer , inspired by the NightHawk FireBlock tool from MDSec, is designed to block outbound traffic of running EDR processes using the Windows Filtering Platform ( WFP ). It supports terminating various processes related to EDR products from Microsoft, Elastic, Trellix, Qualys, SentinelOne, Cybereason, Broadcom Carbon Black, Tanium, Palo Alto Networks, Fortinet, Cisco, ESET, HarfangLab, and Trend Micro. By incorporating such legitimate red teaming tools into their arsenal, the goal is to render EDR software ineffective and make it a lot more challenging to identify and remove malware. "The WFP is a powerful framework built into Windows for ...

A suspected nation-state adversary has been observed weaponizing three security flaws in Ivanti Cloud Service Appliance (CSA) a zero-day to perform a series of malicious actions. That's according to findings from Fortinet FortiGuard Labs, which said the vulnerabilities were abused to gain unauthenticated access to the CSA, enumerate users configured in the appliance, and attempt to access the credentials of those users. "The advanced adversaries were observed exploiting and chaining zero-day vulnerabilities to establish beachhead access in the victim's network," security researchers Faisal Abdul Malik Qureshi, John Simmons, Jared Betts, Luca Pugliese, Trent Healy, Ken Evans, and Robert Reyes said . The flaws in question are listed below - CVE-2024-8190 (CVSS score: 7.2) - A command injection flaw in the resource /gsb/DateTimeTab.php CVE-2024-8963 (CVSS score: 9.4) - A path traversal vulnerability on the resource /client/index.php CVE-2024-9380 (CVSS score:...

The U.S. Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) on Wednesday added a security flaw impacting Ivanti Endpoint Manager (EPM) that the company patched in May to its Known Exploited Vulnerabilities ( KEV ) catalog, based on evidence of active exploitation. The vulnerability, tracked as CVE-2024-29824 , carries a CVSS score of 9.6 out of a maximum of 10.0, indicating critical severity. "An unspecified SQL Injection vulnerability in Core server of Ivanti EPM 2022 SU5 and prior allows an unauthenticated attacker within the same network to execute arbitrary code," the software service provider said in an advisory released on May 21, 2024. Horizon3.ai, which released a proof-of-concept (PoC) exploit for the flaw in June, said the issue is rooted in a function called RecordGoodApp() within a DLL named PatchBiz.dll. Specifically, it concerns how the function handles an SQL query statement, thereby allowing an attacker to gain remote code execution via xp_cmdshe...

It's the age of identity security. The explosion of driven ransomware attacks has made CISOs and security teams realize that identity protection lags 20 years behind their endpoints and networks. This realization is mainly due to the transformation of lateral movement from fine art, found in APT and top cybercrime groups only, to a commodity skill used in almost every ransomware attack. The lateral movement uses compromised credentials for malicious access – a critical blind spot that existing XDR, network, and SIEM solutions fail to block.  Identity Threat Detection and Response (ITDR) has emerged in the last couple of years to close this gap. This article breaks down the top five ITDR capabilities and provides the key questions to ask your ITDR vendor. Only a definitive 'YES' to these questions can ensure that the solution you evaluate can indeed deliver its identity security promise.  Coverage For All Users, Resources, and Access Methods  Why is it important? Par...

The sophisticated malware known as ViperSoftX has been observed being distributed as eBooks over torrents. "A notable aspect of the current variant of ViperSoftX is that it uses the Common Language Runtime ( CLR ) to dynamically load and run PowerShell commands, thereby creating a PowerShell environment within AutoIt for operations," Trellix security researchers Mathanraj Thangaraju and Sijo Jacob said . "By utilizing CLR, ViperSoftX can seamlessly integrate PowerShell functionality, allowing it to execute malicious functions while evading detection mechanisms that might otherwise flag standalone PowerShell activity." Initially detected by Fortinet in 2020, ViperSoftX is known for its ability to exfiltrate sensitive information from compromised Windows hosts. Over the years, the malware has become a relevant example of threat actors continuously innovating their tactics in an attempt to stay stealthy and circumvent defenses. This is exemplified by the increas...

Browser security is becoming increasingly popular, as organizations understand the need to protect at the point of risk - the browser. Network and endpoint solutions are limited in their ability to protect from web-borne threats like phishing websites or malicious browser extensions. They also do not protect from internal data exfiltration, like employees pasting sensitive data to ChatGPT. As it turns out, browser security is also a cost-effective security solution, compared to other solutions that require much more budgets and heavy lifting. In a new report, "CISO Testimonials: 6 Real Life Stories of Cutting Costs with a Browser Security Platform" , six CISOs testify how browser security allowed them to reduce security team workloads and enhance efficiency and security, with a cost-effective browser security solution. CISO Testimonials Throughout the report, the CISOs reveal the tasks they had on their plate and how they solved them in an efficient manner. These are categorized...

Cybersecurity researchers have warned of an ongoing cryptojacking campaign targeting misconfigured Kubernetes clusters to mine Dero cryptocurrency. Cloud security firm Wiz, which shed light on the activity, said it's an updated variant of a financially motivated operation that was first documented by CrowdStrike in March 2023. "In this incident, the threat actor abused anonymous access to an Internet-facing cluster to launch malicious container images hosted at Docker Hub, some of which have more than 10,000 pulls," Wiz researchers Avigayil Mechtinger, Shay Berkovich, and Gili Tikochinski said . "These docker images contain a UPX-packed DERO miner named 'pause.'" Initial access is accomplished by targeting externally accessible Kubernetes API servers with anonymous authentication enabled to deliver the miner payloads. Unlike the 2023 version that deployed a Kubernetes DaemonSet named "proxy-api," the latest flavor makes use of seemingly b...

Managed service providers (MSPs) are on the front lines of soaring demand for cybersecurity services as cyberattacks increase in volume and sophistication. Cynet has emerged as the security vendor of choice for MSPs to capitalize on existing relationships with SMB clients and profitably expand their client base. By unifying a full suite of cybersecurity capabilities in a simple, cost-effective solution, Cynet's All-in-One Cybersecurity Platform empowers MSPs to provide a full breach protection service with a single tool, backed by 24/7 expert support, for rapid profit. All-in-One Advantages for MSPs Traditionally, MSPs have cobbled together security solutions from variety of vendors, leading to a complex and expensive tech stack. Cynet solved this challenge with an All-in-One Platform that includes Extended Detection and Response (XDR), Endpoint Protection Platform (EPP), Endpoint Detection and Response (EDR), Managed Detection and Response (MDR), Security Information and Event Ma...

One of the most effective ways for information technology (IT) professionals to uncover a company's weaknesses before the bad guys do is penetration testing. By simulating real-world cyberattacks, penetration testing, sometimes called pentests, provides invaluable insights into an organization's security posture, revealing weaknesses that could potentially lead to data breaches or other security incidents.  Vonahi Security , the creators of vPenTest, an automated network penetration testing platform, just released their annual report, " The Top 10 Critical Pentest Findings 2024 ." In this report, Vonahi Security conducted over 10,000 automated network pentests, uncovering the top 10 internal network pentest findings at over 1,200 organizations. Let's dive into each of these critical findings to better understand the common exploitable vulnerabilities organizations face and how to address them effectively. Top 10 Pentest Findings & Recommendations 1. Multicast DNS (MDNS) S...

The U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) has disclosed that it's in possession of more than 7,000 decryption keys associated with the LockBit ransomware operation to help victims get their data back at no cost. "We are reaching out to known LockBit victims and encouraging anyone who suspects they were a victim to visit our Internet Crime Complaint Center at ic3.gov," FBI Cyber Division Assistant Director Bryan Vorndran said in a keynote address at the 2024 Boston Conference on Cyber Security (BCCS). LockBit, which was once a prolific ransomware gang, has been linked to over 2,400 attacks globally, with no less than 1,800 impacting entities in the U.S. Earlier this February, an international law enforcement operation dubbed Cronos led by the U.K. National Crime Agency (NCA) dismantled its online infrastructure. Last month, a 31-year-old Russian national named Dmitry Yuryevich Khoroshev was outed by authorities as the group's administrator and developer, a ...

Threat actors are increasingly abusing legitimate and commercially available packer software such as BoxedApp to evade detection and distribute malware such as remote access trojans and information stealers. "The majority of the attributed malicious samples targeted financial institutions and government industries," Check Point security researcher Jiri Vinopal said in an analysis. The volume of samples packed with BoxedApp and submitted to the Google-owned VirusTotal malware scanning platform witnessed a spike around May 2023, the Israeli cybersecurity firm added, with the artifact submissions mainly originating from Turkey, the U.S., Germany, France, and Russia. Among the malware families distributed in this manner are Agent Tesla, AsyncRAT, LockBit, LodaRAT, NanoCore, Neshta, NjRAT, Quasar RAT, Ramnit, RedLine, Remcos, RevengeRAT, XWorm, and ZXShell. Packers are self-extracting archives that are often used to bundle software and make them smaller. But over the year...